May Update

Social: Prom was fantastic! I had a blast. Toward the end I had an episode, and had to go to the ER at the paramedic's requests. I was also, after prom, asked an amazing thing!
I was asked to write up "My Story" for a Starlight newsletter. I was also asked to be a guest speaker at the Starlight Luncheon in October, both of which I said yes to. !!!!
I also got to go to a friend's house a few times and stay the night, which was cool for realizing I could handle my condition outside of home, without family around. We also got into the house in Summit and started packing.


School: School went well the first half of May, but it was complicated. I was out of my chair full time in all my classes, unless I deemed it a bad day, or my para was uneasy for whatever reason and I stayed in my chair. Still, my grades dropped because my meds stopped being effective at the dose I was on. I also had three bad episodes, which I'll go into more in health. I still kept my grades above C's in all but one class, my junior english class.


Health: Okay, so this sucked health-wise. I had to bump my meds up to 50mg because at 40, I started falling asleep in class towards the end of the day. With finals coming up, I needed as much class time as I could get. On May 8? I had an episode in Geo, just got too hot, and fell out of my desk. I landed on my left shoulder and bruised my collarbone. It took about a month to get over that, but all good now. Then, towards the end of the month, the 18th and 19th, I was in the middle of my med change.

The 18th, I went out to the water fountain outside 3rd period to fill my water bottle. I slipped on some water, scared myself, and hit my head when I went down. I was taken to the ER for a CT scan, and let go with just a goose-egg. I was taken to TG, because I'm no longer young enough for MB, so it was a bit new. But it went so well, we weren't concerned.

Then, the 19th, things were a bit more serious. I had a sub para, and the school nurse and her assistant were also out. Now, I'd worked with all 3 subs before, so I wasn't concerned for the day. However, after 3rd period, I was using the bathroom and had an episode. During the episode, I started having shallow breathing. This is something that's happened before, but the sub nurse apparently thought I stopped breathing, and said she couldn't feel my pulse. She began CPR. To restate, I DID NOT stop breathing. Fortunately(Un?) she wasn't pressing hard enough, and didn't break anything. When the paramedics got there, they put me on O2, ran an EKG, and weren't concerned, but took me to the ER to be checked, for obvious reasons. Things were a bit more hectic that visit, with multiple IV's started and more tests run, but things still went smoothly.

I also had a fugue state on the 24th, the Monday after. I was given Narcan when the paramedics were treating me because I was in a very deep episode, and my breathing was again shallow. Even though the responding medics knew me, they hadn't ever seen me so out. We think the seriousness of the episodes was due to med change/finals/moving stress.

Eventually though, my meds leveled out and things got back on track towards the end of May.